Later, Tomorrow, Whatever…Here you Go
Okay, gentle discipline. GENTLE discipline. What the living hell, you ask?
When the boys were smaller I made certain assumptions. I assumed they cried and made noise for a reason. I assumed they didn’t know or cared when mommy needed quiet, or a drink. I assumed they didn’t know how to eat at a dinner table unless I helped them and showed them the rules/customs. I assumed they needed to feel good to behave well. I assumed they had not been through the years I have and therefore, didn’t know everything like I do. I assumed I needed to provide guidance, love, and to help them meet boundaries. I assumed they were children.
Somewhere down the line I threw my assumptions into a McDonald’s drive-thru window and started expecting my eleven and ten-year-old sons to act like adults. Naturally, I was irritated that they didn’t automatically meet my expectations out at dinner with friends. I was irritated that they couldn’t anticpate when I would find a particular noise so annoying my nerves would glow an intense red. I was irritated they played with toys, laughed, sang, or ran around the house when I WAS WORKING MY GOD STOP I’M WORKING RIGHT NOW CAN’T YOU SEE I’M WORKING!
In addition to forgetting that I have children and not peers, I do not take care of myself. I rarely drink water, I eat extremely sporadically, I want to but don’t exercise very much, I’m a pitiful sleeper. It’s just a matter of uh, der, Melissa, if the kids do not act nicely when they feel like dogshit, so do you. In essence, I’m mad, cranky, irritated, and yelling a lot right now.
And this whole time, I’ve been functioning as though I need to correct my kids’ behaviors. Both Mike and I have moved to this place of wanting the irritating behavior to stop right now. Forget what the kids need long-term, that their behavior is normal kid behavior, or that their relationship with us overall is more important than any behavior. We are yellers, like our parents. Which, ugh.
Enter, Gentle Discipline.
I’ve recently been able to attend two small, intimate sessions with author Hilary Flower. I’m not one to read a book and immediately bow down to all things authored and printed. I think most parenting books suck, wedging guilt and shame and fear into the still-smooth sections of one’s heart. I can’t stand self-help books. I hate most magazines. I generally don’t like the authoritarian tone of these things and I believe parents know best. I also believe none of us know what the hell we are doing and are doing the best we can. I think that’s why I like Hilary and her book, Adventures in Gentle Discipline.
She wrote the book, but she didn’t write the book. She talked to parents all over and THEY wrote the book. She asked, “What are you doing?” “Does it work, like, ever?” “What are the negative pressures in your life that affect how you parent?” Hilary has three kids, and she nursed one off and on during the sessions. She was practical and down to earth. She said to ignore other people’s judging eyes and make your own damn behavior rules. She said a dozen times that she thought her publisher was crazy for even asking her to write this, because she’s normal. She yells sometimes. She says that sometimes a harsh no is absolutely in order, but screaming a harsh no all the time makes it ineffective. She compiled the answers parents gave her and she explicitly says that what works for one parent, doesn’t work for all of us. The book is published by La Leche League, but regardless of your feelings about the organization, this is a good book to read through.
I’m not selling you on this book. Or saying it’s the gold nugget you’ve been looking for. I’m saying this makes sense to me. All gentle discipline means is that you attempt to deal with your child with compassion and respect. The way you know you’re doing it is if you have a good relationship with them.
The biggest thing that hit me is that I do not take care of myself. I allow myself to get thirsty, hungry, tired, cranky. How do I expect to view the boys’ actions with any compassion? How can I care about their needs when all I want to do is nap? I just can’t. I’m too irritated to deal. Whether they are being loud because they’re fighting or playing, it doesn’t matter to me. I just want them to be quiet.
And really, why do I ever want them to be quiet at our own house? They’re KIDS!
I need to quit expecting them to know what I want them to do. If I have boundaries, it’s my job to meet them halfway and help them achieve those boundaries. If I have rules, they have to be clear. (I’m often not clear on my expectations.) If I’m tired, I need to recognize that the problem right now is me, not them. It’s okay to tell them to quiet down because I need 30 minutes of quiet, it teaches them to help take care of others’ needs too. If I just yell “STOP IT!” they miss out on learning compassion. I need to keep us all on better food, more water, more sleep. I put my eleven and ten-year-olds to sleep at 8, why were we going to bed at 1 am?
Another thing that hit me is that when I yell, and they listen, I’m teaching them to be compliant. To conform to what everyone else wants. I do not want that. I want them to be individuals who stand up for what they believe, regardless of popularity. I want them to be avid questioners, to be opinionated, to listen, to have compassion and respect for others, but never be sheep. When we yell directives, we’re teaching them to be sheep.
I need to let go of feeling bad when I’m not gentle and let go of any self-congratulations when I am gentle. It’s not about that. It’s not about doing gentle discipline “right.” It’s about trying my best. Mike trying his best. We want to have a healthy relationship with our kids, not teach them how to conform.
Posted by Melissa on June 6th, 2006 under Spawn
June 6th, 2006 at 10:02 pm
I can relate to so much of this. This was a great post.
June 7th, 2006 at 7:53 am
What no one will tell you is that this is not just how you build strong relationships with your children. This is an essential tool for building a strong relationship with anyone.
We teach other people how to treat us by how we treat ourselves. Children of alcoholics often have more trouble with this than other people because they are often raised without having been granted their own boundaries. You must set boundaries and insist other people attend to them. You must respect yourself and set a baseline standard of your own behavior toward yourself before you can do this.
It’s a lot easier to teach other people compassion and also plain, ordinary consideration — not to mention how to respect themselves — when you first (a) have compassion for yourself and (b) understand that you have to communicate to other people that you are worthy of consideration through your own words and actions first. As you’ve discovered, when people know that you have needs, they are more likely to try to meet them at least some of the time, even if they are children.
Ugh, no lecture intended. This is just something with which my true love, also raised by an alcoholic, has struggled. In his struggles, he has taught me a thing or two, which I only mean to share. Sometimes I think self-respect and self-esteem are sort of like magic charms with spells on them that prevent people who have them from explaining how they got them to others who need them. Still, though, I know you’ve got some; you couldn’t have had this little epiphany if you didn’t. Just keep hold of the knowledge that you’re supposed to have respect and compassion as well as give them, and that you deserve respect and compassion, and it will mature into something that glues you even tighter to the people you love.
I’m talking like a freakin’ self-help book. I do only mean to be helpful and supportive, though. Take it how you will.
Cheers!
June 7th, 2006 at 10:13 am
Very lovely post and a beautifully designed site. My first time to visit. Really, your site is awesome.
Cheers.
June 7th, 2006 at 11:37 am
Sara, definitely not taking your comment as a lecture! Thank you for all of your words, they definitely hit home and mean a lot to me to hear them.
June 7th, 2006 at 2:03 pm
I would tend to agree with Hillary. Sometimes a harsh no IS required. 3 year olds have that “selective hearing” thing…especially when Barbie as Rupunzel (ugh) is on for the 3rd time in 1 day. I too am a “yeller” and a door slammer. Please don’t call CYS but there has been occasion for the butt-slap too. Just an attention-getting smack, not a beating.
I know there will be a time when I can softly say, “Maggie, honey??? THe VCR is NOT a mailbox. So could you Please NOT mail your barrettes to Barbie in the VCR” and she will look at me with those big, blue eyes and say, “Oh, OK Momma.”
June 7th, 2006 at 3:05 pm
Cat, I try to do the “Please” thing too often and it doesn’t work for the boys because, apparently, they take it as an option! I never realized that until someone in the session mentioned it and I was all, DAMN, THAT is what I thought I was doing when I was gently parenting. I need to be firm, yet respectful. I have no clue what that looks like yet, but I’m working on it.
June 7th, 2006 at 8:47 pm
Excellent post. I love what you say about yelling and being compliant. It is so true. That’s how my house was run and I found that when I was in college I had to teach myself how to make decisions.
Also, I was an au pair in Paris and I found out quickly that I got better results when I treated the kids with respect and compassion and was explicit with my instructions/desires. I’m hoping that I’m able to do this with my own son, but sometimes, when it’s your kid, it’s harder, I know.
Sara- such a good observation about kids of alcoholics. My dad is an alcoholic and my boundaries are all out of whack. I have trouble making decisions and I have trouble standing up for myself sometimes because, well, it’s easier.
They say that all parents screw their kids up to some degree and I could stay up at night for the rest of my life trying to figure out how I’m going to stick it to my son.
June 9th, 2006 at 8:43 am
Great post. ANd you are right. Growing up I was expected to act like an adult. My mom was always screaming me and spanking me. ANd now I expect my son to act like an adult too… I’m better than my mom but do speak to him in an irritated tone fairly often. And I hate that I do that… Thanks for posting about this book. I need to check it out.
June 9th, 2006 at 10:22 pm
[…] I have to thank you for all of your great comments regarding our personal adventure in gentle discipline. Jesus gay, thank you for helping us feel normal and sane and somewhat headed in the right direction with how we raise these batshit crazy creatures called “children.” So far, it’s going really well. We haven’t yelled at them in almost two days. Their father picked them up yesterday morning for the weekend. […]
June 13th, 2006 at 10:12 am
Thank you for this post. Yes, yes, yes.
June 14th, 2006 at 11:39 am
Thank you for the inspiration. We’re leaving Babyville and entering Actual Discipline Land and I have no map and no idea what to do.
June 14th, 2006 at 12:02 pm
I really liked this post. I have run into the same things - the tired, cranky etc.
It gives me food for thought.
Thanks